After Hours
by Obfuscatress
Summary: Five times Bond noticed the details and the one time Q got the big picture.


_**A/N:** Please note the first two scenes were written months before SPECTRE came out, so the whole timeline in this is a tad ambiguous. Sort of moves from post-Skyfall time to post-SPECTRE time without actually addressing SPECTRE._

* * *

 **1.**

To James Bond, the low glow of aged cage lights in the tunnels branching out under MI6 is soothing in the same way Eve Moneypenny's sly grin serves him as the warmest imaginable greeting. Bond still likes to wander the untouched structures of Churchill's bunker network with their grimy brick walls closing in on him in winding intimacy that is lacking in the new tunnel they built between HQ and Q-Branch. But he isn't the only one to have trudged tracks into stale dust and Bond can well imagine the old M scrutinising this very passage years ago before she'd approved it as Six's emergency retreat. Bond supposes he did have one thing in common with her: a love for the old, traditional things, even if they lived in an ever evolving world in the midst of a rapid evolutionary race of mass destruction. Something about heroic hearts and such. All he knows is that somewhere in the mess of it she'd gotten caught up in her own past, leaving only him - a blunt instrument - and an ugly ceramic dog as her legacy.

The sentimentality of it would disgust her, though he supposes it's far too late for that beyond the grave. And Bond isn't doing much better himself; not when he hasn't slept in two days. But for once his gun is intact and Bond is determined to return it before passing out in bed with a cocktail of painkillers and whisky distracting him from a broken rib and a cluster of bruises all over his torso. Q-Branch faces him as an iron door in the wall with a biometric scanner, installed since the time he unlatched the bolt two years ago and triggered an intruder alert much to Q's never ending annoyance.

Three green lights blink at the top of the scanner, when he places his hand on it, the door popping open just a crack. Sometimes it crosses Bond's mind that Q could easily lock him out of every database in the world, exile him, make him disappear from history once and for all. It's a frightening display of the potential he possesses despite his young age, but Bond lets it slip his mind most of the time, because he isn't a double-oh for nothing. He walks under the dimmed lights of the usually buzzing tech and intelligence department among the quiet hum of fans and continuously running servers. The bullpen lies empty with the night staff tucked away in a separate area and Bond makes out for Q's office.

He finds the Quartermaster hunched over a desk with a miniscule screwdriver in one hand and a circuit board in the other. "What do you want, 007?" he asks without looking up.

"I came to return my equipment."

That earns him two still hands and a surprised look. "You mean to tell me you brought something back that isn't shrapnel or a molten lump of metal?"

"Your lack of trust wounds me," Bond says mockingly and produces a standard issue gun from his holster and a radio from his pocket. "Do I get a good boy reward now?"

"Hardly," Q snorts and returns to fixing whatever appliance he's decided to take apart earlier. "But unlike me, you do get to go home and sleep."

Bond cocks an eyebrow at that.

"Do you know how long it takes to fill out your post mission paperwork when I have to file for constant budget expansions due to your escapades, Bond? And it's all paper too. I suppose Britain will never cease to be a proper, paper pushing bureaucracy."

Q's brow furrows as he speaks and Bond notices a small screw on the floor beside the desk, glinting suspiciously in the unfriendly neon light streaming from the ceiling. He picks it up and sets it down in front of Q with a nonchalant quip of, "I don't run the place. I merely pull the triggers".

Q stares at the screw with his eyes going fuzzy from what Bond assumes is lack of sleep. He picks it up absentmindedly and says, "You seem to also have an affinity for blowing up several embassies for no conceivable reason. How many is that now? Three?"

"That last one was an excep-"

"Whatever," Q mutters, growing impatient. "Did you have anything else than a desire to annoy me, Bond? If you don't mind, I'm due to handle 004 in three hours and I really need to finish this."

Bond shrugs and decides it's best to leave it alone for now. "Good night, Q."

"Night, Bond."

 **2.**

Argentina is suffocating, even under the rhythmical rotation of a wide ceiling fan in the dark of a lifeless night. It does nothing more than push the hot air around with an incessant humming, covering up the sound of traffic outside. Bond doesn't know whether he's still sweating from before his shower or already sweating again as he steps out of the bathroom with a towel draped around his waist. It's a hateful sensation, though he's happy to escape frigid London.

It's too late where he is now to do any kind of work - and far too early in London - but, when Bond plugs in his earpiece to check in with Q, he is there regardless.

"I found the blueprints for the sublevels of the building," Q announces and Bond pulls his laptop onto the bed to look at them. In the background he hears Q's rapid fire typing.

"Do you know where they're holding Loayza?"

"No. The security system is set up internally, if they even have an electronic one." There's a short pause during which he can hear Q inhale forcefully. "I would presume they keep tabs on the place," he continues and Bond notices the unusually rough undertone in Q's voice followed by a sniffle.

"Are you alright?"

"Yes, why?"

"You sound…" As he looks for a word, Q sneezes and Bond says, "sick."

"I'm fine. Why is everyone being such a pest about this? Moneypenny had the audacity to suggest I take a sick if I had the bloody leverage to with everything in such a wretched state."

The childish irritation in Q's voice is just about the most amusing thing Bond has heard in days and muttered in delightfully posh English no less. He smiles to himself and says: "Silly her. England would fall."

"It bloody well would. And who'd babysit the double-ohs? Half the world would be on fire within the hour. MI6 without me is as useless as M without Moneypenny." As an afterthought, Q adds, "Don't ever let him know I said that."

"As amusing as seeing his reaction would be, I don't think that is leverage I have. Moneypenny would castrate me on the spot, if I were to jeopardise your career unnecessarily," Bond comments dryly.

Q huffs, which only ends up in a coughing fit. Eventually, because the man is too stubborn for his own good, he wheezes, "And where was she during the incident in Bulgaria?"

"That was not per se my fault," Bond says, though he realises blowing off the face of a historical building does look a tad not good. Returning to the actual subject at hand, he asks, "Is there an outlet I ought to plug you into tomorrow to access their system?"

"If they have surveillance, get me on the line. Or, R actually. I won't be here tomorrow."

"Appointment with your pediatrician."

"Haha," Q says and Bond can hear the eyeroll. "I don't know how to break this to you, but I was actually asked to pick up your rollator. Fully weaponized of course, to celebrate your retirement."

This time it's Bond's turn to roll his eyes. Silence unfolds over the phone and he takes it as a chance to finish his lukewarm, watery scotch that he abandoned on the nightstand half an hour ago. "Are you still there?" he asks eventually, because he can't even hear the typing anymore.

"Yes."

"You should try honey for your voice. And don't let Cecil hear you; he's an incurable hypochondriac."

"Will do," Q says and the gurgle of a kettle starts up at his end. "Anything else?"

"No."

"Well then, break a leg, I suppose." He hangs up with those words, because they aren't in a business with time for unnecessary acts of courtesy such as farewells, especially not when it's five am for one of them. Sweating into the cotton sheets, Bond thinks about the high pitch of Q's voice right before he's about to sneeze. He falls asleep under the fan and dreams about cool darkness that oddly resembles the Thames at night.

 **3.**

It's November by the time he gets back to London and, despite having spent a decade in never ending drizzle on a grimy moor in Scotland, Bond is not used to the pervading wetness that coats the city. He's too tan from a month under the tropical sun to blend into a pale crowd sniffling with the flu as they wrap themselves tighter into their woolen coats. He's five time zones away from the world around him and it's disorienting even to him.

"James." Moneypenny greets him with the cheerful manner and mischievous smile she directs at everyone who's survived having been shot by her. The list is not very long.

"Miss Moneypenny." He puts on his best falsely seductive voice (a running joke that's stopped being funny) and leans on the edge of her desk. Her coffee smells divine and Bond isn't normally an arse about caffeine, but he's about to keel over, so he directs his best pleading look at her.

"Don't even think about it. If I don't consume that within the next five minutes, England will crumble before you even make it out of the office."

"I've got two fractured toes and a torn muscle in my back and I just got off a sixteen hour flight on a tiny, turbulence ridden plane."

"Uh-huh. I don't care. Besides, you'll have to bribe me with more than a three tier box of chocolates."

"So you did get those?"

"Yes," she says in a way that tells him she's eaten them all too, "but I've made more powerful alliances in your absence, so that isn't going to cut it anymore, unless you can seriously up your game."

"I know M buys you pretty things when he forgets your birthday and Tanner takes you to lunch, but what could possibly outdo authentic belgian chocolate?"

"Well, Q for instance, named a cat after me."

And just like that he's got nothing on her anymore. The dumbfounded 'what' that slips from his tongue has her lean over her desk oozing with self satisfaction.

"Ooh, you didn't know, did you?" Eve coos.

She may be the unrivaled queen of office gossip, but Bond has to kick himself for not noticing something so basic. He's slipping up and she knows it. In an attempt at a dodgy defence, he says, "He just seems the type to value his tech and tea mugs too much to risk getting a cat involved."

"Two actually." Now she's teasing him, big grin spreading on her face.

"Isn't that just exciting. Moneypenny-"

He doesn't get any further with his threat, Tanner and Q entering the small office right as he's leaning over Moneypenny's desk to tower above her. It is instantly crowded and the two of them lean away from one another never having been fond of having their childish little squabbles on public display.

"Look what the cat dragged in," Q mutters and Moneypenny hides her knowing smile behind her coffee cup.

Tanner says, "You do rather look like a wet dog. Moneypenny, is M in yet?"

She shifts her focus to the intercom and Bond turns to take stock of the two men discussing a personnel reform. Tanner most certainly hasn't been home in far too long, suit wrinkled and the bags under his eyes slowly puffing up with exhaustion. Q doesn't seem much better for wear: his hair is the exact same mess as always, eyes bloodshot behind his glasses, though he's wearing a suit today. Bond notices a few stray, gray cat hairs at the cuff of his sleeve, some more of another colour plastered on the side of his right leg. He drifts off wondering who feeds the creatures while Q is busy keeping the world from falling to pieces.

"Bond?"

"Sorry?"

Moneypenny rolls her eyes at him. "I said you need to go through the psych eval before M sees you. I've scheduled an appointment at one. Don't be late or so heaven help me."

He nods absentmindedly and makes a move to leave, Tanner taking his place to look through the week's calendar. Bond is already almost out the door when Q lifts his head, seemingly having just remembered something.

"007," he says and Bond has come to instinctively halt at the sound of his voice by now. After all, it's saved his life before.

"Q?"

"I do hope you'll find the time to turn in your equipment before noon."

For a moment, Bond is stunned - or perhaps it is guilt he feels - because his gun is stuck in a drain in Antwerpen. If Q knows, he doesn't show it.

Instead, he arches an expectant eyebrow. "Is there a problem?"

"No, not at all. I'll be down by eleven." Bond offers a placating smile and gives a last nod to Tanner and Moneypenny before he heads out and decidedly avoids going to the psych ward. That little Italian coffee shop two streets down should be opening soon enough to waste the next few hours in.

 **4.**

It is on a Monday in late January M finally decides to do his head in for interdepartmental theft because this time there is no grand countdown to the end of the world he stops at the last minute; only two dead bodies in a Cambodian alleyway, a trashed Audi being fished out of a bend of the Mekong, and a lost list of missile launch codes 003 has been sent after in his place. Moneypenny has stopped answering his calls, Tanner has finally taken that long weekend he has talked about for two years, and Q seems livid when he's not pointedly avoiding him. Bond isn't sure whether he should apologise. He certainly wants to, but he suspects it's become a meaningless serenade by now.

For now, he decides halving his mountain of paperwork and leaving anonymous coffee cups on Moneypenny's desk will do. At least until his sprained wrist heals and Mallory's passive-aggressive wrath loses its edge. Until then he's stuck sneaking up to the roof for solitary lunch breaks like a kid sat in the shame corner.

He's not supposed to be up there, but there's something comforting about London rattling on with the stoic wave of the Union Jack on the opposite roof. Bond cracks the fire escape door open with his good arm and looks around for something to jam the door with, which is when he spots someone sat on the ledge of the roof with their back to him smoking. He freezes for an instant, about to leave when he realises the coat is familiar as are the hands disappearing and reappearing behind the fold of the man's hood. He secures the door without a sound and creeps over the gravel.

"Q," he says conversationally and buries his hands in his coat pockets. Bond doesn't expect him to whip around in surprise, tea cup slipping out of his hands and they're both stunned for a split second before Q's face twists in pain at the hot drink spilling down his front.

"Bloody Christ," he hisses and the cup bounces on to fall off the ledge. Seconds later it shatters on the pavement below with the sound carrying back up as a quiet cracking. "Fucking shit, that was my favourite mug!" Q says and yanks a pair of earbuds out from under his hood. "Bond what the hell do you think you're doing?"

He gets to his feet, tea seeping into his trousers as it drips off his coat and Bond is stuck between apologising profoundly and bursting out laughing.

"This is not funny, you git! I could have fallen off the bloody roof! Try explaining that to Mallory."

"No, look I really am sorry. I had no idea you were having some sort of brooding moment up here."

"I am not brooding!" Q shouts. He rubs furiously at his trousers with the sleeve of his parka and pointedly does not look at Bond. It does nothing to conceal the flush in his cheeks.

Bond fishes a handkerchief out of his pocket. "Here."

He receives a skeptical look from Q, who takes the handkerchief anyway. Bond gives him some space to clean himself up and detangle his earphones from the many layers of clothes stuffed under the coat. He glances over the ledge of the roof down the back of the new HQ and wonders if anyone saw the mug fly past their window, if there's any tea splattered on an office window, who will find the remains of Q's mug.

"Was it the scrabble mug?"

"What? Oh that, yes," Q sighs, "I got it from Moneypenny, so good luck trying to explain to her what happened to it."

"I really am sorry," Bond offers again with a guilty grimace to drive the point home. "Especially about the trousers."

"Yes well-"

"I can pay for dry cleaning."

Q startles him with a laugh. "Bond, I'm not nearly impractical enough to buy clothes you can't abuse with a washing machine, so thanks but no thanks. Besides, I was only up here to caffeinate myself."

"Then let me buy you tea. I've volunteered to be Moneypenny's errand boy for the next two weeks anyway, although it looks more like four after that mug incident."

"I won't tell if you don't and I have to admit tea does sound lovely right about now."

"Earl Grey?"

"Assam, actually."

Bond arches an eyebrow, though now that he thinks about it, Q doesn't smell like Earl Grey at all.

He explains: "I'm not about to have breakfast tea all day. Besides, Assam has a higher caffeine content."

"Of course it does. Milk? Sugar?"

"Why don't you go discern that from the puddle down there?"

 **5.**

He doesn't mean to incorporate fetching Q tea into his routine, but it happens anyway and Bond decides it's as good as any other way to apologise for the 32 guns he's lost under his new Quartermaster. It's nowhere close to making up for the motor boat or the time he broke a fountain pen on Q's desk and spilled ink all over his precious budget. Three weeks in, he's cleared for field duty and so he finds himself placing the last cup of tea on Q's desk with a sly smile.

"What have you got for me today, Quartermaster?"

Q shoots him a look and goes for the tea. "Standard issue Walther PPK/S 9mm short, as per usual. You've been authorised to carry a modified Breitling Transocean 38, incorporated photographic film and camera for intel recovery. I've made it bulletproof for your convenience, so for the love of God, try not to break it."

He attempts a sweet smile handing over the watch and gun, but lets it fall flat without care. "I'd prefer not to spend another year budgeting around your despicable track record."

"Should I take offence?" Bond asks.

"I'd rather you looked after the gun instead of your ego. Now, if you'll excuse me."

He maneuvers around Bond to return to his laptop. Q takes a sip of his tea, shoves half a biscuit into his mouth, and ignores Bond in favour of answering the comm. Packing up his gear, Bond notices a near empty pack of chocolate digestives beside his mission dossier. He supposes he finally knows what the man lives off during his fourteen hour workdays. It also occurs to him it is something he could remedy.

 **+1**

The mission is a short in-and-out that has Bond back in London within the week and almost back in Mallory's good graces. He's got both the gun and the watch, even if the display is cracked. He feels a strange sense of pride leaving it on Q's desk without a note, sure to be recognised and elicit a frustrated sigh at managing to break the unbreakable and yet leaving it in a functional condition. He keeps the gun on himself for good measure because some things simply have to be done in person.

That is the very reason he finds himself in London's dampest tunnels after eleven with a nicked keycard to activate the R&D elevator. There aren't any biometric security systems in place here despite the many pet projects Q houses in the underbelly of the vehicular department and Bond wonders if that's a testament to the sense of privacy Q perceives to have retained in his lab. He clutches his few purchases - and he simply refuses to call them presents - considering whether he's breaching some sort of unspoken agreement with his mere presence.

Too late, Bond thinks when the elevator stops. He's had better incentives to get into trouble, but this will do just as well. The office is dark and the light from the elevator pours over the floor, fading brightness that just and just reaches Q at his desk.

"Bond?" he asks, hands stilling. He licks his lips and the hum of the monitors behind him is all Bond can hear for a short while. "What are you doing here?"

"I came to return my gun." He flashes his charming smile and fishes the firearm out of his holster to hand it over to Q by the muzzle.

The incredulous look he receives is reason enough for him to have come. Q takes the gun from him and inspects it with deft movements that rival his own. "Why didn't you return it with the watch?"

"One can't leave firearms lying around unsecured. That would be irresponsible, Q."

"Oh my god, the nerve you have," Q says as he stores the gun under lock in his desk drawer. Bond can tell he's smiling even with half his face hidden in the shadows.

He takes it as invitation to lean over Q's desk and mutter, "You can hardly blame me for being concerned of the safety of your staff."

"You aren't even concerned about the safety of Moneypenny's terrier," Q shoots back. He is almost at Bond's level sitting up straight. His eyes twinkle with mischief and Bond swallows his excitement.

"Now you're just being mean. We both know that dog is the devil."

The smile ghosts across Q's face again and Bond mirrors it involuntarily. They're five inches apart, an easy distance to lean in, if he so pleased.

Q glances down at the desk, untouchable and yet so undeniably present. He clears his throat and asks: "What's in the paper bag?"

"The-" he swallows his surprise and recalls what he came for - decidedly not the gun - and pushes the bag towards the Quartermaster. "It's something I got to make up for destroying your tea mug."

He watches Q pull a brand new scrabble mug and a pack of chocolate digestives out of the bag with genuine delight surfacing through his initial surprise. "Bond, you really didn't have to. It was an accident."

"Still."

"And the biscuits?"

"Well, those are there in case you would happen to reject my invitation to dinner."

"Your what?"

"I assume you haven't eaten in hours, if at all today, there's a vietnamese place only a few blocks away that's open until two, and I may or may not have a bouquet of flowers in the passenger seat of my slightly illegally parked Aston outside. So, what do you say?"

Q blunders and blinks at Bond with his bewildered look slowly turning into understanding. It's been awhile since Bond has broken a nervous sweat asking someone on a date and he's starting to wonder if he's cocked this up royally.

Eventually Q asks: "Are they roses?"

"What?"

"The flowers, are they roses?"

"God, no. Red asters." He doesn't know if the symbolism is lost on Q, but he bites his tongue and reminds himself to have what they promise: patience.

"Looks like you've learned something after all," Q says, "I'll get my coat."

* * *

 _ **A/N:** _

_1\. Caffeine concentrations of various teas coffees will always be a topic of dispute, but according to my quick research Earl Grey seems to come in at 25-50mg while Assam is approximately 80mg. Brewing methods will affect this._

 _2\. Asters (as referenced) are meant to symbolise patience. Combined with the romantic colour red, they reflect Bond's intentions towards Q in (what I will admit is) a disgustingly sappy move._


End file.
